I just re-adjusted my blog so that I didn’t have so much personal information thrown out there…you know how it is these days. Can’t trust anyone. 😉

But I found this draft that I never finished or published, and it really resonated with me. Thought I would share and exand on my thoughts….

I think God wants us to grow up. Yes, me. Yes, you.

How so? I’m a full-grown adult. I can grocery-shop, pay my bills, and even apologize on my own without being told. I get up for church without my parents’ help, I take care of my yard, and I have a full-time job at an office.

Jeff has been touching on this theme at church (you can listen online if you’d like) as we go through the book of Jonah…you know Jonah, guy in the belly of a fish, then gets spit up onto dry land. I missed the first two weeks of going through that book for various reasons, so I’m jumping in at chapter 3. And it’s great because a) I’m learning what lengths God will go to in order to MATURE us and b) I’m learning I’m more like Jonah that I would like to admit…stubborn, selfish, and sometimes of the attitude that I simply avoid God because Idon’twannadowhatHesays.

This is where I stopped (how convenient). But it’s funny because I read something today by Oswald Chambers that really stuck out to me. It said,

If a man cannot get through to God, it is because there is a secret thing he does not intend to give up- I will admit I have done wrong, but I no more intend to give up that thing than fly. People want the blessing of God, but they will not stand the thing that goes straight to the quick.

When we (mostly I) feel far from God, I tend to suggest that God has moved from ME…that He has left me to my own devices for a bit because what I do in this season of my life doesn’t really matter.

Well, that’s not true. God cares very much what we do in all of life because it is a gift and we are called to give it up for others. There is no point in time that what I do doesn’t matter to God. So if I feel I can’t get to God, there’s probably something I am hanging onto and God wants to remove and so I’m fighting Him over it, all the while complaining He hasn’t done in my life what I want Him to.

Not saying that once I give whatever it is up, I get what I want…but in giving up whatever it is, I get what GOD wants for me…and if that’s more patience? More maturity? More humbleness?…than so be it. My heart is learning to want what He wants anyways (albeit slowly). Maybe I just need to GROW UP and wait on God and be THANKFUL…thankful that I have a good job, that my sweet husband is my best friend, that I have wonderful family and friends, that we are provided for in thousands of ways, every single day.

Long story short, I want the blessings and treasure of a heart that follows Christ. But if I can’t simply obey in the things that are on my plate right now, than what am I really after?

So then, those who suffer according to God’s will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good. 1 peter 4:19

Prayer is an attitude toward life that sees everything as ultimately sacred, everything as potentially life-changing, everything as revelatory of life’s meaning. It is our link between dailiness and eternity.
– Joan Chittister